Tag Archives: surveillance

Episode 194: Mass Bioterrorism, Runaway Artificial Intelligence, and Other Romps with Rob Reid Our interview this week is with Rob Reid, author of After On and Year Zero, two books that manage to translate serious technology nightmares into science fiction romps. We cover a lot of ground: synbio and giving eighth graders the tools for… Continue Reading

Episode 190: Interview with United States Senator Sheldon Whitehouse In our 190th episode Stewart Baker has a chance to interview United States Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) has a long history of engagement with technology and security issues. In this episode, we spend a remarkably detailed half-hour with him, covering the cybersecurity waterfront, from the FBI’s… Continue Reading

Episode 186: What Stephen Paddock Can Tell Us About 702 Reform Our interview is another in our series on section 702 reform, featuring Mieke Eoyang of the National Security Program at Third Way and Jamil Jaffer of George Mason University and IronNet Security. They begin with the history of the program but quickly focus on proposals… Continue Reading

Episode 173: Interview with Richard Ledgett Today we deliver the second half of our bifurcated holiday podcast with an interview of Richard Ledgett, recently retired from his tour as NSA’s deputy director. We cover much recent history, from Putin’s election adventurism to questions about whether NSA can keep control of the cyberweapons it develops. Along the… Continue Reading

Episode 169. In Which Ben Wittes Gets to the Right of Stewart Baker, to the Likely Eventual Embarrassment of Them Both In the news roundup, Benjamin Wittes makes a cameo appearance, defending Jim Comey (but not the FBI) from my suggestion that leaking has a long and unattractive history at the FBI. Brian Egan takes… Continue Reading

Episode 162: The Law of Armed Vibrators In this episode, I debate Michael Schmitt, a prime mover in two Talinn Manuals on international law and cyber operations. We are joined by an expert on the topic and a new Steptoe partner, Brian Egan, who was formerly the State Department legal adviser, among other accomplishments. And… Continue Reading

Episode 158 is a bonus episode – the Triple Entente Beer Summit, where members of the Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast, the Lawfare Podcast, and the Rational Security Podcast assemble over beer to comment on the events of the week – or in this case, the day, since it was among the most news-filled days of President… Continue Reading

Episode 152: “Alexa, do you have first amendment rights?” Our guest for episode 152 is Paul Rosenzweig, and we tour the horizon with him. In the news roundup, Stephanie Roy outlines the deregulatory tangle around ISPs, privacy, security, and the FCC. Maury Shenk briefs us on the European legislation authorizing the quashing of terrorist advocacy… Continue Reading

Our guest for episode 119 is Kevin Kelly, founding executive editor of Wired Magazine and author of The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces that will Shape our Future. Kevin and I share many views – from skepticism about the recording industry’s effort to control their digital files to a similar skepticism about EFF’s effort… Continue Reading

Our guest for episode 114 is General Michael Hayden, former director of the NSA and CIA; he also confirms that he personally wrote every word of his fine book, Playing to the Edge: American Intelligence in the Age of Terror. In a sweeping interview, we cover everything from Jim Comey’s performance at the AG’s hospital… Continue Reading

No holds are barred as a freewheeling panel of cryptographers and security pros duke it out with me and the Justice Department over going dark, exceptional access, and the Apple-FBI conflict. Among the combatants: Patrick Henry, a notable cryptographer with experience at GCHQ, NSA, and the private sector; Dan Kaminsky, the Chief Scientist at White Ops;… Continue Reading

Did China’s PLA really stop hacking US companies for commercial secrets? And does it matter? In episode 92, we ask those questions and more of two experts on the topic ‒ Washington Post reporter Ellen Nakashima, who has broken many stories on PLA hacking, and Tony Cole, the Global Government CTO with FireEye, who has… Continue Reading

Our guest for episode 90 is Charlie Savage, New York Times reporter, talking about Power Wars, his monumental new book on the law and politics of terrorism in the Obama (and Bush) administrations. I pronounce it superb, deeply informative, and fairly unbiased, “for a New York Times reporter.” With that, the fat is in the… Continue Reading

The cyberlaw podcast is back from hiatus with a bang. Our guest is Peter Singer, author of Ghost Fleet, a Tom Clancy-esque thriller designed to illustrate the author’s policy and military chops. The book features a military conflict with China that uses all the weapons the United States and China are likely to deploy in… Continue Reading

James Baker, General Counsel of the FBI, is our guest on this week’s podcast. He fearlessly tackles the FBI’s aerial surveillance capabilities, stingrays, “Going Dark,” encryption, and the bureau’s sometimes controversial attribution of cyberattacks. But he prudently punts on the Hack of the Century, refusing to reveal details of the FBI investigation into the Houston Astros… Continue Reading

Privacy advocates are embracing a recent report recommending that the government require bulk data retention by carriers and perhaps web service providers, exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction over data stored abroad, and expand reliance on classified judicial warrants. In what alternative universe is this true, you ask? No need to look far. That’s the state of the… Continue Reading

Our guest for Episode 70 of the Cyberlaw Podcast is Dan Kaminsky, a famous cybersecurity researcher who found and helped fix a DNS security flaw. Dan is now the Chief Scientist at WhiteOps, but I got to know him in an unlikely-bedfellows campaign against SOPA because of its impact on DNS security. Dan and I… Continue Reading

Our guests for Episode 68 include Julian Sanchez, senior fellow at the CATO Institute where he studies issues at the busy intersection of technology, privacy, and civil liberties, with a particular focus on national security and intelligence surveillance. They also include the entire May meeting of ISSA- NOVA, which kindly invited the Cyberlaw Podcast to… Continue Reading

On May 20, 2015, the Department of Commerce Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) published a proposed rule affecting exports of intrusion software, surveillance systems, and related systems, equipment, software, and components. The proposed rule provides for new and amended export control classification numbers (ECCNs) for these “cybersecurity items,” resulting in new licensing and reporting… Continue Reading

Episode 65 would be ugly if it weren’t so much fun. Our guest is Bruce Schneier, cryptographer, computer science and privacy guru, and author of the best-selling Data and Goliath – a book I annotated every few pages of with the words, “Bruce, you can’t possibly really believe this.” And that’s pretty much how the… Continue Reading

Our guest for Episode 50 of the Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast is David Sanger, the New York Times reporter who broke the detailed story of Stuxnet in his book, Confront and Conceal: Obama’s Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Power. David talks about his latest story, recounting how North Korea developed its cyberattack network, and… Continue Reading

Our guest commentator for episode 49 of the Steptoe Cyberlaw podcast is Juan Zarate, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the senior national security analyst for CBS News, a visiting lecturer at the Harvard Law School, and chairman and co-founder of the Financial Integrity Network. Before joining CSIS, Juan… Continue Reading

Our guest for the podcast is Shaun Waterman, editor of POLITICO Pro Cybersecurity. Shaun is an award-winning journalist who has worked for the BBC and United Press International; and an expert on counterterrorism and cybersecurity. We begin as usual with the week’s NSA news. NSA has released its second privacy transparency report. We’ve invited Becky… Continue Reading

If you think Edward Snowden and Glenn Greenwald have stopped attacking NSA, you haven’t been following them closely enough. While American media have largely lost interest in Snowden and Greenwald, the pair continue to campaign outside the United States against the intelligence agency. Their most ambitious effort was in New Zealand, a member of the… Continue Reading

Stewart Baker

Stewart served as the first Assistant Secretary for Policy at the Department of Homeland Security where he set cybersecurity policy, including inward investment reviews focused on network security. More

About This Blog

Steptoe Cyberblog, with its sometimes contrasting insights, serves up opinionated and provocative thoughts on the issues — especially cybersecurity and privacy — that arise at the intersection of law, information technology, and security.

Stay Connected To Steptoe

About Steptoe

Steptoe & Johnson LLP is an international law firm widely recognized for vigorous advocacy in complex litigation and arbitration, successful representation of clients before governmental agencies, and creative and practical advice in guiding business transactions. The firm has more than 500 lawyers and other professionals in offices in Beijing, Brussels, Chicago, London, Los Angeles, New York, Phoenix, San Francisco and Washington. For more information, visit the Steptoe website www.steptoe.com or contact us directly by visiting our Contact Page.